


Fire

by Rebness



Category: Interview With the Vampire (1994), Vampire Chronicles - All Media Types, Vampire Chronicles - Anne Rice
Genre: F/M, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-21
Updated: 2016-11-21
Packaged: 2018-09-01 07:41:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,551
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8615452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rebness/pseuds/Rebness
Summary: Lestat wouldn't call himself a coward, but sometimes it's easier to run than acknowledge you're trapped.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to my lovely Bernadettedpdl for encouragement and beta, as ever.

Ding!

Lestat winced and gripped the steering wheel harder as the song paused on the car’s bluetooth radio, momentarily interrupted by a notification on his cell. He didn’t need to look at whose name had flashed up on the screen; much less did he need to guess what would be written there - it would be one of three:

 _Seriously_?

or:

 _I_   _shouldn’t have expected anything less_

or:

_Childish brat_

If he was particularly unlucky, it would be all three and then a follow-up text listing all the terrible things he had ever known and the various therapies he should undergo.

He drove on.

The drive out to his chosen place of rest for the night was a leisurely one, and he knew the route by heart, whether by car or on foot or horseback, or fleeing the smouldering remains of one’s erstwhile home with a suicidal and irritating fledgling. He loved the River Road regardless, and though it was a cold night, he let the top down on his Audi (last year’s model; he really should upgrade soon) and turned the music up. Not too loud, he decided.

‘It’s a sop to my old age!’ he announced to an audience made up of his car and the trees and the silent dark road ahead. He swung the car carelessly to the right to avoid a pothole. ‘A year I’m away from this place,’ he muttered. ‘And still they haven’t fixed the damned road.’

He had spent the new year through to spring holed up in Buenos Aires. He had enjoyed a love affair with a mortal woman in these months; she was fiercely smart and sexy and he had enjoyed the fling immensely, losing himself in a woman who had the heady devil-may-care attitude of the young and dispossessed. When June came around, he had accompanied her to Europe.

They’d gone to Barcelona. He had set her up in an ostentatious place in Pedralbes, with great Grecian columns and a pool framed by a manicured lawn which required sprinklers constantly throughout the summer. They had visited the city almost every night, dancing and walking and watching the tourists pounding after pickpockets on the Ramblas.

There were a number of French-speakers there, and he had listened to them as he sauntered through Gracia, blending in with the hipster crowds. He had dallied with a gorgeous young Breton, all dark hair and lean artistic mien, and then tired of him and killed him that very night.

The restlessness set in, as it always did. The gorgeous young things returned to their respective cities or fled for the Canaries. He wandered the huge department stores listlessly, casting a critical eye at uninspiring coats and shoes and belts and no unwilling fledglings to dress up as dolls. He found himself walking through some little alley one night and an apologetic man had dangled a six-pack of beer in his face and asked, ‘ _Cerveza_?’

He had reached into his pocket absentmindedly and slapped a fistful of euros into the man’s palm and, ignoring his effusive thanks, allowed himself to drift skywards, smirking down at the frightened, angry shouts which followed him.

***

The playlist he had carefully composed for his solo driving expeditions pulled up Don’t Fear the Reaper. He sang along to it joyfully, shouting out the lyrics. He didn’t need New Orleans; just being out here, in the welcoming Louisiana night, was enough. He was fearless and safe and dangerous.

***

He had landed in New York after he left Barcelona. After a few nights, he had met up with David. It had been a pleasure to spend time there, and become lost in the anonymity of the city with his closest friend at his side.

They had gone to see a play by some English dullard who fancied himself cleverer than he actually was, but he had enjoyed the acting and had latched on to a line which he found himself repeating that night:

‘It's the best possible time to be alive, when almost everything you thought you knew is wrong.’

‘It resonated with me,’ he had told David over a cup of untouched coffee later (he ordered a ridiculous concoction of various syrups and temperature the coffee should be brewed at, and demanded a special roast, out of some quick sadistic streak; and then he had tipped the furious barista $50 in mute apology afterwards). ‘You must understand, everything was being challenged in that first score-and-a-bit of my mortal life. People blasphemed without being burned at the stake.’ He had shrugged. ‘Well, maybe they still were in Carcassone, the savages, but not in my town. And suddenly it was fashionable to care about science, and reason--’

‘I wouldn’t have called it sudden,’ David had countered. ‘It was a gradual change. The Revolution was a johnny-come-lately to what was going on in Engl--’

‘Yes, yes,’ he had said. ‘I don’t wish to get into all that turgid Rue Royale talk. What I mean is that it is a thrill to have one’s expectations confounded once in a while.’

‘Rather than confounding the expectations of others,’ David agreed. ‘I must say, though, even your casual cruelties are no longer a surprise. Perhaps you should try a different tack.’

‘I’ll be in New Orleans soon enough,’ he had scoffed. ‘I don’t care to be led.’

He had picked up his car from the garage he had abandoned it at a year earlier, and made the drive down to Louisiana, stopping off for several days in Tennessee and spending a couple of weeks in Alabama, catching up with old friends. He had decided he wasn’t in a hurry, after all.

October came around.

He had sent the text on the required day: _Happy birthday! You made it through another year of blaming me for it all, and I don’t even ask for so much as a kiss in return._

The reply had come two days later:

 _Thanks_.

He had sent back:

 _Oh, fuck you_!

Of course, he had regretted it almost immediately, and written out and deleted various further messages which alternated between apology and accusation, then he had turned his cellphone off for three nights.

When he turned it back on, he couldn’t say if he were relieved or angry to see that there had been no response.

It was early November by the time he finally reached New Orleans. He had to park on Bienville due to the throngs of tourists, and as he sauntered to his home at Rue Royale he gathered up his stock responses for the varied receptions he expected.

But by the time he had burst into the flat, he knew that nobody was there. The lights were on low, and the bundles of discarded possessions about the place assured him that his most annoying roommate was living there, and had merely stepped out for one of his predictable evening pursuits.

Lestat made his way to his room and turned on the lights there and pulled open the heavy drapes to see the street alive and bright outside. He wandered to the ensuite bathroom and began to pull at the shower screen, only to freeze as he heard footsteps on the iron stair outside, at a pace and a weight so familiar to him that he swallowed.

He didn’t know quite why he did it, but he was at his bedroom window in an instant, pulling it open, and he landed onto the road with catlike grace. And then he was running, away from the house, and was back in his car and driving away from New Orleans before he knew it.

***

Past Destrehan now, and the trees with Spanish moss draped low, beautiful and relentless. The road was wide and open and his.

The track ended and another began. Lestat snorted. ‘But of course,’ he said. ‘Just my luck.’ He hovered a finger over the skip button, but pulled away after a moment, shrugging.

‘ _You had a hold on me right from the start, a grip so tight I couldn’t tear it apart…_ ’ he sang softly, tapping his hands on the steering wheel. He glanced across the road. It was easy to imagine a horse running through the fields there, its nostrils flaring with terror, its rider hellbent on one goal, one task, one man.

He shook his head, more to rid himself of the sickly feeling crashed through him than the image of the horse. He turned up the song and sang along with it, louder, breaking the silence of the night around him. ‘My nerves all jumpin', actin' like a fool, well your kisses they burn but your heart stays cool…’

His gaze flicked to the cellphone, then back to the road.

‘Romeo and Juliet, Samson and Delilah… baby you can bet their love they didn't deny…’

Lestat rubbed at his forehead tiredly. He didn't sing along to the next verse. 

‘Your words say split  
But your words they lie  
'Cause when we kiss  
Mmm, fire…’

He swung the car into a small dirt road, backed up rapidly and swung around, accelerating into the direction of New Orleans.

‘Asshole!’ he spat, reaching down and picking up his cellphone. He swiped the screen to finally read the message:

_Won’t you come home?_

He smiled, and pressed repeat on the playlist.


End file.
